Well after nearly a full season I have to say, after today, I believe his signing has been a huge error. I have defended him a couple of times when he has had the odd good game. Today he looked totally finished and was playing like he had grease on his hands the way he kept fumbling the ball. Legs also looked gone. He has been a good un, but he has nothing left at this level.

We make scrape to safety this season but if we go with him and Miller as our prime halves next year relegation will be the most likely scenario

Well and truly shot

He's argubly been the best scrum half of his generation, but nothing lasts forever and his time has been and gone. I said it on here at the time i was against his signing but a two year deal was lunacy, he has been on the decline for a while. But i doubt he will walk out on his last years fulltime contract so we are stuck with him.

We don’t have to accentuate the error in giving him a two year deal by playing him though

Or by sticking Hampshire on the wing. Might has well have put bill tupou on wing and played Arundel. Miller put himself about today but Broughs kicking which he was brought in for, was pretty poor. Regardless of the cheat Marshall the kick was a shocker and would have been a 7 tackle set.

Brough wasn't great but I didn't think he was so bad.
He was having to kick the ball with players well offside hitting him.

But I don't get the moaning about Chester playing him. He's the best we have. Hampshire isn't the guy.

He could captain our reserve side

Don’t belittle our reserve side please, I watched the game v Halifax on Trinity tv and the play the ball and passing game was quicker than most of our first team attempts.

Hampshire needs to be on the ball more and Brough less so.

Hampshire is not going to be with us next season. Brough is . A dreadful situation to have got into . Finn was slow but he made fewer errors .

well I'd disagree with that had Hampshire be given this season to play in the halves with miller I fair bet we'd of had a better season, the only thing Brough got right yesterday was to patronise the ref as to where to take the tap off

I guess we'll never know.

Have to agree.
Now is the time to throw caution to the wind and give Hampshire a run at SH.
He's a HB not a winger and he's not a FB either.
I really don't understand why Hampshire constantly gets played out of place - it begs the question of why did we sign him in the first place?

Every single coach he's played for has done it to the best of my knowledge.

You're right PT, and I guess we'll never know why, but as a spectator it's puzzling.
After the next two games we probably won't have that problem anyway.

I thought Brough's passing was well-off in the first half. It was why Wigan were able to get in our faces so much, because Miller and others were constantly getting passes that were a little high or just behind them, so it never seemed like we could attack the line.

Very good article here on the ageing process and athletes, and the physical changes that go on in the body, looking at how Tom Brady has defied it, principally by changing his playing style, using his brain rather than his body.

[urlhttps://www.theguardian.com/sport/2019/aug/22/the-formula-one-secret-behind-tom-bradys-time-cheating-dominance[/url

The guy is a pocket passer and barely gets touched. He isn't expected to put his body on the line and take hits anywhere near as much as an RL player. I dare say some RL players would be able to play at 40+ were they able to constantly avoid contact.

Interestingly though, that is how Liam Finn remained effective until he retired, even though he was a Championship player for most of his career, because you could see at the end that he played with his head, not his body. I think Broughy thinks he's the same person he was ten years ago, when he clearly isn't.

We know how we finished last season with Hampshire playing in the halves and we know where we are today with Brough. Miller has been a constant so therefore we can make an educated guess.

ha we did try telling you when you were all getting excited about signing him he was past it and thats why we let him go, he was gonna take you to the next level wasnt he?

Probably signed to play in the halves (with Reynolds as cover) but, Brough was seen as too good a deal to turn down.
THe Brough of 5 years ago would have been great but, unfortunately, despite his absolute desire to win, he is on the downslope, which at 37 1/2 years old, is no surprise.

Quite possibly. Although I'd imagine it's far too late for Broughy at this point, given how he has put his body on the line all his career.

There was plenty of moaning back then too. We had no 6th tackle plays. That's what started the need to look for someone like Brough.

The thing is before he got injured, loads of people were eating humble pie, saying how well he was playing which obviously contributed to us getting to 3rd in the league?! I thought he was doing ok until that Wigan game, but apart from the odd game, since he's come back it's like he's aged another 3 years in his legs! It's a problem though for next season, one thing that Chester is......is he seems quite a stubborn person, and I can't see anything other than Brough starting again next year......

Broughs been poor more than hes been decent this year. And forgetting Marshall cheating, Broughs kick was rubbish.